Friday, December 8, 2017

Many holiday main course recipes involve expensive
ingredients, and/or time consuming, complicated techniques, not to mention the anxiety
that comes along with worrying whether all that time and money will have been
worth it. I’m looking at you, dry, overcooked beef wellington.

If you want to avoid all that, maybe consider making tourtière.
This French-Canadian meat pie is hearty, satisfying, easy to make, visually
impressive, relatively affordable, and since it’s best served at room
temperature, doesn’t require any kind of precise timing.

You can also easily tailor this to your own tastes, since
other than the ground meat and mashed potato, pretty much anything goes. Or,
make it just like this. I’ve only had tourtière a handful of times, so I’m
certainly no expert, but I thought this came out extremely well, and I wouldn’t
change anything when I make it again.

Although, I may try it with some beef gravy, as a few of my
Canadian friends have suggested. Some even suggest ketchup, which I did try on
a cold slice, and not surprisingly it was delicious. But, no matter how you
serve this tourtière, I really do hope you give it a try soon. Enjoy!

Ingredients for one 9-inch Tourtière:

For the crust:

3 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon kosher salt

1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, sliced, frozen

7 tablespoons ice cold *water

2 teaspoons white distilled vinegar

*add a little more if dough isn’t pressing together

1 large russet potato, boiled in enough salted water to
cover (reserve water)

1 tablespoon butter

4 cloves garlic, crushed

1 large onion, finely chopped

1/2 cup finely diced celery

1 pound ground pork

1 pound ground beef

1 cup potato water, plus more as needed

For the spice blend:

2 teaspoons kosher salt

1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

1 teaspoon dried thyme

1/2 teaspoon dried sage

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1⁄2 teaspoonground
ginger

1⁄4 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1/4 teaspoon ground allspice

1/4 teaspoon ground mustard

1/8 teaspoon ground clove

pinch cayenne

For the egg wash:

1 large egg

1 tablespoon water

Please note: Once your filling has cooled, taste for salt,
and adjust before filling the crust.

Thank you Chef John! A wonderful recipe that hits close to home. I grew up in a border town and spent my youth pursuing similar goals as you described in your video. I reckon we are alumni of the same school. My wife insists that I try your rendition of this classic. Yum!

Ok, so first things first: I'm guessing you while you were in town you were drinking our excellent Canadian beer and checking out Chez Parée :)This recipe looks amazing. My Grandmother and Mom always made this at Christmas, but I've never attempted it - this recipe has , as usual, made me believe I might actually be able to pull this off!Thanks so much for all the amazing work you do. My family actually thinks I can cook now :)Happy holidays, Chef John, to you and your family!

G'day Chef John, To an Aussie the concept of a cool or cold meat pie is terrifying. Hot meat pies with Tomato Sauce (Ketsup?) is a deeply rooted tradition.However, this recipe looks so interesting I will give it a go. Might even add a bit of ground left over duck with some veal and have this on Boxing Day (look it up).

Could you please answer a vital question that has, I think, slightly marred some of your recipes when I do them. This Kosher Salt you always use; I can't buy it downunder and when I use the same amount of sea salt my dishes are always way over salted, even for my salt loving taste. So what's the skinny with the difference between Kosher and Sea salt? Do I quarter, halve or change the type of salt completely?

Other than that, your recipes have been inspirational and have rekindled the passion for cooking in this ol' retired cook. Thank you!

All the best for Christmas and the New Year! Bill Halliwell Hobart Tasmania

AHHHHHHHHHH!AHHHHHHHHHH!!AHHHHHHHHHH!!!You're going to do poutine!?!?! Ohhhhhh! Yesss!You know, a promise made is a debt unpaid!Wow! Your video not only just made my day but also my whole holiday season!Ohhhh! Yeah! You've done it again!Lov u 4 ever!♥Thank you soooo much!

Oh! I forgot, your video of tourtiere is amazing!And you hit all the marks with it.Can't wait to try it out.And now I need to buy a food processor to make the dough, asking Santa Claus first though ;-)Best wishes to you, CJ!

Wow, I certainly wasn't expecting a Quebecois dish. Does this mean there's a chance of a poutine video in the future? It's crazy how such a simple thing as poutine can be done so wrong, I'd love too see Chef John's take on it.

This is one of my family traditions. Every December I make three or four, freeze one or two, and make sure there is some in the fridge for the offspring to dip into as needed. There are many definite dos and don'ts with regards to the recipe, ie. no potato!, or no onion!, or all the vegetables! I use potato, onion, celery, carrot, maybe greens even, (no brassicas, though) anything to get in more vegetables.

Merci Chef! My father used to eat is with maple syrup. No surprise there! And we enjoy it with fruit ketchup (something like chutney). Your crust is amazing! Happy to see this family classic on your blogl

Chef John, I've been eating Tourtière every Christmas and New Years since I was a boy. Even after moving to China I still make it, to truly experience the holidays while living in a nontraditional Christmas environment. I haven't even watched the video yet, but I scanned the ingredients for some key items; cloves, dry mustard and sage. Merveilleux.

Hi Chef Jon, Thanks so much for doing a French Meat pie video! Before she passed my mother made sure that I knew her recipe. At the time I didn’t really care for meat pie, but now I love it. I like to have it with horseradish and ketchup. Not traditional, but very delicious. Another delicious dish in our family was pork roast with brown potatoes, which Is probably more of a technique.I love your pie plate! Can you tell me where you got it?Thanks for representin’ us French Canadians! We all love your videos and humor in our house! And we learn alot , too!

Thanks again for the great recipes and videos! Feeling a bit sorry that no one had commented on this post. I made this a couple of days ago and it turned out great, despite having a food processor that was too small. Instead of your filling, I experimented and made it like a chinese pastry I love that is usually something like a flaky turnover but filled with a curry beef mixture. Why not a pie version? So I used your combo of beef and pork with the onions, celery, garlic and potato combined with about 1 1/2 tablespoons of curry powder. I liked the way you used the potato water to hep break up the meat. I used a potato masher instead of the wooden spoon and that seemed to help. Hate seeing the cooked ground meat looking like little noodles! Anyway the result was a very delicious curry beef/pork pie that even my wife enjoyed!

Greetings, Chef. I made this today and had a great time doing it. The steps dovetail into one another nicely and I got the dough and the filling done at about the same time - about an hour all-in. Then chilled the dough and let the filling cool. Rolled out the dough and assembled the pie in a 10" cast iron skillet. it took about 10 minutes, mostly due to timidity - next time I will be "the Rambo of my dough". Baking took a full hour and I did not achieve the beautiful brownness you got in your video - need to check my oven temp, I think. As I write, it is cooling on a rack and smelling delicious. We will have it for supper tonight, without gravy. perhaps tomorrow. Thanks for a great recipe. I have tasted all the parts, so I know this is going to be fantastic. So unless there is some problem, no news is good news.

Chef, thank you!!! Since moving away from Montreal I have missed a proper tourtière. Quick question (as the meat is simmering on the stove). At what point in the process can we freeze it? I am making the dough right now and wondering whether I should freeze the meat and dough separately and assemble for Christmas, or can I put it all together up to the edge crimping phase and then freeze? That probably adds some baking time at the end but that's fine. I just don't want the pie bottom to get soggy while it freezes?

I am wondering if there is a lineage. Seems the consensus is a derivation of and empanada, certainly in the form, but perhaps a blending os something familiar mixed with something new? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natchitoches_meat_pie

Anyway, added juice of half a lemon to the meat...and I am in Louisiana, so a lot more Cayenne, 50% more spice.